Knowledge gaps in potato technology adoption: The case of central highlands of Ethiopia

Abstract

The paper intends to identify knowledge gaps in potato technology adoption among farm households in Welmera, Ethiopia. Within the district, four administrative peasant associations were selected based on their potato production potential. From these peasant associations, a total of 112 farm households were selected using a simple random sampling method proportional to population size. The sampled households were interviewed by using a structured interview schedule. Group discussions were undertaken with selected households, development agents and researchers to gather qualitative data. For data analysis, statistical tests like t-tests, chi-squares and one way analysis of variance (ANOVAs) were used to test the variation of means and associations among the sampled households. About 79.5% of households were male headed, whereas the remaining 20.5% of households were female headed. ANOVA results indicated that there was significant variation in the adoption index score in sampled households. Non adopters, low adopters and high adopters account 46.4, 27 and 27% with the mean adoption indices of 0.0000, 0.5233 and 0.74. Moreover, all recommended potato production packages were not implemented by all adopter farmers. Low adopters used seed rates, fertilizer rates, diffused light stores (DLS) and chemical applications below the recommended packages. On the other hand, high adopters used seed rates and DLS below recommended quality and spacing and fertilizer application above the recommended rate. The overall finding of the study underlined the high importance of institutional support in improving seed rate, DLS construction, spacing, fertilizer rate and chemical application. Therefore, research center, development agents and other stakeholders should provide on farm extension training, strengthening cooperative societies, and improving market condition to fill knowledge gaps in adoption of improved potato production packages.